Flushing away the Census toilet question
In the next Census Bureau American Community Survey, respondents will no longer be asked whether they have flush toilets in their homes. People pushed back against this question because it felt like an invasion of privacy, or maybe an unnecessary bit of info for the government to have.
However, this measure was important at estimating the number of people in the US that don't have access to plumbing and sanitation. The last survey found that 1.4 million people lack access to indoor plumbing, including a hot/cold running sink, a shower/bath, or a flush toilet. The question was multiple choice, you checked off each plumbing feature that you have in your home. In the next survey, the list will still include the other plumbing features (sinks and showers), but not the flush toilet.
It wasn't a perfect measure - you could have a flush toilet that was connected to a drain that ran straight to a river (common in some rural parts of the country) - and you'd be considered as having adequate plumbing. But it was still a critical data point.
Because the flush toilet question received some negative attention from the public, the Census Bureau conducted an internal analysis to see what the impacts of removing the flush toilet option from the survey would be. They found that about 39,000 people did not have a flush toilet but had the other two plumbing facilities. If the toilet question was removed, they would be erroneously considered to have "complete plumbing facilities." This would increase the number of housing units with complete plumbing facilities by 1% or more in thirteen counties across the United States.
In other words, removing the "flush toilet" option from this question will have the effect of over counting the number of people in the United States with adequate plumbing, which has implications for the amount of federal funding provided for housing improvements to vulnerable communities.
These seem like small percentages. While a majority of people living in the United States enjoy access to clean drinking water and sanitation, millions of Americans have fallen between the cracks, and it is estimated that the number of people in the United States without adequate water access is going to rise. However, you don't know what you don't measure.
Photo credit: Erica Gies
If you need a good deed for the day, write to your representative and ask that they put this question back in. And if you want to learn more about the water access gap, look for the forthcoming report on the water access hotspots from the US Water Alliance and Dig Deep. I also recommend supporting the work of these trailblazers working on improving access to water and sanitation in their communities:
- Catherine Coleman Flowers, Senior Fellow, Environmental Justice and Civic Engagement at the Center for Earth Ethics: https://centerforearthethics.org/team/catherine-flowers/
- Miguel Chacon, Financial Director and Housing Program Coordinator, AYUDA Inc. https://ayudaorg1.wixsite.com/ayuda
- Ann Marie Chischilly, Executive Director, Institute for Tribal Environmental Professionals https://www7.nau.edu/itep/main/About/staff_AMChischilly
These leaders spoke in a panel discussion on the water access gap at the US Water Alliance One Water Summit last week and the work they're doing is difficult, necessary, and redemptive.